


This is the Way

by RubyStiff89



Category: Star Wars, The Mandolorian, The Mandolorian (TV Show)
Genre: Currently just a one shot, Din gets badly hurt, I figure an old buddy is the best chance, I may add to this later idk, No Smut, Original Character(s), Someone needs to make Din ask Cara out
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-29
Updated: 2020-11-29
Packaged: 2021-03-10 00:48:51
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,722
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27775627
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RubyStiff89/pseuds/RubyStiff89
Summary: Mando goes to Crait, nearly dies and gets rescued by another Mando with whom he has history
Comments: 2
Kudos: 33





	This is the Way

**Author's Note:**

> I dont know what I'm doing here, writing Mando fanfiction but whatever. 2020 has been a trip but we have one small green child and a shiny latino single dad making it better

The glint of the dim sunlight off the beskar gave away his position.

  
There wasn’t a lot on Crait- an abandoned rebel base, some critters and salt. All the salt in the galaxy it felt like loosely dusted over an otherwise red planet. High up on the cliff face, suspended by a single wire Cerria Adis saw him moving on foot on thought her eyes were playing tricks on her. Pulling the scope off her rifle, she lifted it to the visor of her helmet and got a closer look at the Mandalorian striding through the valley. He didn’t look exceptionally tall, definitely human and dang farrik all that beskar.

“So that’s where all the beskar has gone, you greedy bastard,” she muttered under her breath, her accent rough revealing her home planet, Jakku. “I can’t get my damn thigh plates repaired because you’re wearing it all.”

Cerria watched him for a little longer wondering what his business on Crait in the middle of winter was. It was very rare for two Mandalorians to be in the same place at the same time, not that he knew he wasn’t the only one here. Cerria was guild, like this chump probably was, but she specialised in critters for clients, zoos and anyone else who could pay. Vulptex lived in rocky crags, nimbly darting over near vertical cliff faces and were tricky to catch but so worth the pay check. She had to catch four, ideally three females and a male for a wealthy client in Corscuant but decide to stalk to the other Mando instead. Using her zipline she dropped down to halfway along the canyon wall where a narrow path wound down into the canyon floor. The Vulptex could wait.

She trailed him for a few kilometres down the valley, careful to keep well out of blaster range and close to the jagged valley wall. He hadn’t looked over his shoulder once but Cerria knew her own kind well enough to know he probably had a feeling, that crawling sensation you get down your spine that you’re being watched. He hadn’t stopped or checked coordinates or done anything else to give away what he was up to so Cerria was none the wiser about what he was up to. She had just begun wonder whether she should just do the human thing, get his attention and then duck before asking what he was up to when she heard it.

Snapping her head around she heard the hum of speeders before she saw a dozen of them with Stormtroopers drop over the canyon wall. Cerria dived for cover, her white and grey mottled suit and armour gave her great camouflage even though she knew they weren’t after her. He heard them moments later, drawing his blaster and running for cover behind a boulder. Cerria watched, her head just visible about the rock as the Stormtroopers roared past her blasters firing towards the other Mando. He took down three, shooting the blaster out from one which wiped out the two speeders and their riders beside him when the impossible happened.

The luckiest shot ever preformed by a Stormtrooper nailed the Mando in the wrist, one of his few vulnerable shots, knocking the blaster from his hand. Cerria swore diving out from her hiding spot realising that even with his rifle looking thing, ten against one was bad odds and she wasn’t about to watch one of her own be killed by stormtrooper scum. The mando was on his knees, trying to wrangle his rifle with one hand while clearly crippled in agony as another stormtrooper got a second shot in between the edge of helmet and chest plate at close range. Still a few hundred meters away, Cerria screamed out a highly insulting, profanity at the Stormtroopers who whipped around and started blasting. Cerria quickly took down four, drawing them towards her as she darted between the rocks. The red pulses of light from their blasters bounced off walls. She lured the Stormtroopers into a narrow corner, threw in a detonator and dived for cover.

One lucky stormtrooper, perhaps smart enough to see the trap coming jumped out of the rocks after her, Cerria shooting him in the head over her shoulder as she ran for the fallen Mando. He was face down in the salt, Cerria initially thinking the red in the salt was the red planet showing through but as she skidded to her knees beside him she realised was blood. A lot of it. Cerria swore, rolling him onto his back and reaching for his wrist. She quickly ripped his glove off finding the blaster wound was bad but had mostly self-cauterised as glancing blows tend to do, it was the shoulder that was bad. Blood soaked through his clothes and into the salt as Cerria glanced around spotting one speeder on its side. Ripping and end off his already tattered cloak, she bunched it up and shoved it into the wound. She got up and dragged the speeder back upright, grateful that it started first time. Sometimes Imperial trash worked, she thought before turning back to her fallen brother.

Cautiously, she lifted him up wrapping and arm under his uninjured arm and began to pull him across the salt flats towards the speeder. This must have torn at his injured arm as he woke suddenly with a strangled scream which Cerria was glad to hear, she had wondered if he was already dead. She let him drop slightly so she could look down into his visor.

“I got you, I need to get you on the speeder and to safety so you gotta work with me dude,” Cerria said.

“Grogu,” he groaned in agony.

“I dunno what that is but this probably wont tickle,” Cerria said before roughly lifting him onto the speeder. The motion caused him to gurgle out another scream before presumably blacking out in her arms as she tried to arrange them on the speeder. He wasn’t the heaviest Mando she tried to haul around but he definitely wasn’t the lightest and not for the first time she was grateful at being above average height and built like a brick outhouse.

It took nearly twenty minutes to get him to her ship, a large freighter that was a bugger to park but handy for hauling rathtars and baby sarlaacs. Why anyone would want either as pets was beyond her but she didn’t ask those kind of questions. Abandoning the speeder, Cerria managed to fireman lift the other mando in her ship, aware of his blood soaking down her shoulder under the plates of her own armour. Moments like these she wished she had an offsider, even a damn droid to fly the ship into hyperspace so she could deal with him. Dropping him on her cot, Cerria slammed her fist on the control panel shutting the door before sprinting through the ship, leaping over crates to the cockpit. Normally a stickler for her pre-flight safety checks she ignored them this time, powering up the ship and lifting heavily off the ground. As soon as they were airborne, she pointed the nose skyward, grateful Crait didn’t have a star port as she punched in the coordinates for a highly illegal jump to hyperspace while still in atmosphere. She felt the engines kick up a gear and the ship vibrated before ripping forward at the speed of light, pushing her back into her chair. The feeling of your organs being sucked out of your spine as the ship makes the jump never gets old but as soon as the ship hit cruise, Cerria was out of her seat and diving for the ladder down into the lower decks.

He was still alive, Cerria hauling him back onto the cot as he had half slid off with her illegal manoeuvre into space, crumpled up against the crates at the foot of her bed. Rapidly Cerria began removing his chest plates, grateful that all Armourers work off the same set of plans so every Mando in the galaxy’s armoured plates lock together in the same places. The beskar clanged against the steep floor making Cerria envious of how much beskar this dude was wearing, not that it saved him this time. Cerria gently peeled back the torn flaps of fabric, grimacing under her helmet at the damage that definitely tore muscles and tendons. The bleeding had slowed but any disturbance caused a fresh trickle to ooze out. Deciding there were no other alternatives, Cerria reached up into the cabinets above her bed and pulled out the medpack and scissors. It took a few quick swipes to cut the shirt off his lean, tanned torso which revealed a surprise Cerria wasn’t expecting.

“Din Djarin?” she said out loud to no one as he was still very much unconscious.

It was an old tattoo but unmistakeable and in the exact same location as her own mythosaur head on her right bicep. Cerria felt her shoulders go slack as she stared down at him, flashbacks of academy, training and then graduation running through her head. Four identical tattoos got on the same night, at the same definitely dodgy tattoo place after a lot of booze, before the four friends went their separate ways in life. Two were dead and the last two were here, with one clinging to life. Cerria shook her head and got to work.

There was only so much she could do except administer pain relief, cauterise the wound and do her best to stitch it together. If he survived, he would need it looked at by someone who wasn’t goofing off during medical training and taught herself the rest on the job. Not that she got injured much going after space critters- cuts, bites and grazes mostly. Not like this idiot who was clearly being hunted by remnants of the Empire which despite what they thought on Coruscant, was still very much alive. The Mudhorn insignia on his pauldron was interesting- she still had yet to receive hers- and Cerria wondered how and why he ended up with a Mudhorn as his. She had hauled one Mudhorn in her career and vowed never again because unlike a baby sarlaac that stopped fighting once restrained, Mudhorns would kill themselves trying to get free... Which hers did by tearing a hole in the side of her ship and throwing itself overboard.

Those Jawas didn’t know what hit them when a mudhorn fell from the sky…

After an hour of work she flopped down beside his cot, desperate to pull her helmet off and wash her face. Exhaustion began to creep up on her, she had been tracking Vulptex for most of the day before this happened and she didn’t count on having a shootout with stormtroopers and saving her old academy buddy on the list. Cerria looked over her shoulder as he slept peacefully before finding a blanket to throw over him and dragging a chair over. Propping her boots up on the side of the cot, she leant her head back and allowed herself to doze.

***

She heard him stir a few times over the next four hours but eventually he came to.  
His hand fumbled for where his blaster was as Cerria sat up and stretched. She wasn’t stupid, before dozing she made sure his blaster was out of reach along with his dagger, shotgun and charges. His helmeted head turned to face her, probably panicking but seemed to freeze when he realised he was looking at another Mandolorian.

“You’re lucky I was there Din, you nearly got cooked by those idiots,” she said eventually. She had hoped he’d recognise her but it had been over ten years and she had different armour.

“Cerria?”

“In the flesh.”

“Where am I?” he asks after a moment of seemingly looking around himself.

“My ship. How you feeling?”

He tries to move his injured shoulder but gasps painfully. Cerria leans over him, examining the wound which she has left open for now but will put plaster on it once its dried in the artificial air of her ship. She patched his wrist up well enough; it would leave a nasty scar but he had plenty of those.

“Whats it been? Like ten years?”

“More like twelve,” he replies after a bit.

“I’ve just got us in hyper headed for the nearest space port. I needed to get you as far away from Crait and a few uninterrupted hours to patch you up and sleep before we head back there for your ship. Even then I don’t know if you’re in a fit state to fly,” Cerria trails off.

“Nevarro. Take me back there. I can go back for the Razor Crest once I get my shoulder looked at and I have friends there,” he says firmly.

“You still flying that heap of junk?”

He dosnt answer but she knows he’s glaring at her. He won the Razor Crest fighting a local bar brawler a few weeks before academy ended. It was a good starter ship, except he never upgraded. Cerria and the two other friends in their group Ockpholus and Klayrez gave him heaps about his ship- mostly because none of them had ships but were all convinced, they would get better ones than the ‘Crest.

“Still I suppose you dropped all your credits on beskar and not ship upgrades,” Cerria continues, deliberately winding her old friend.

“You haven’t changed.”

It sounds like a snarky insult but there is a softness to it. Cerria grins and turns, pushing the chair away. “And you owe me one Din, saved your life.”

“Thank you.”

Cerria looks back, noting the sincerity in his voice and dips her helmet in acknowledgement. “This is the way.”

“This is the way.”

Cerria disappears to fix them some food and returns with some reheated stew she made a massive batch of weeks ago. Din has managed to haul himself into the upright position and accept the bowl of stew. Cerria crosses the room and flops down with her back against a crate, facing the other way before pulling her helmet off. Under the helmet she has dark brown hair, plated into two boxer braids and twisted around themselves. Behind her she hears a gentle hiss as Din removes his helmet.

“How’s your head? I didn’t think you took any knocks but I also couldn’t check,” she asks before tucking into her stew.

Din cautiously examines his head, feeling through his dark, loose curls and nods. “I’m a little dizzy but no knocks.”

“Blood loss probably. You’ll feel weird for a bit,” Cerria notes between mouthfuls. “What were you doing on Crait anyways?”

“Looking for a Jedi.”

Cerria pauses, spoon hovering above the bowl. “Din…. Jedi are our enemy. I dunno if you slept through that bit of the academy.”

“Not all of them.”

“Next you’ll tell me all rathtars want is a pat and a cuddle,” Cerria mutters darkly.

Din laughs slightly, which sounds softer without the modulator. “I know that’s not true.”

They sit in silence for a few moments, broken only by the low rumble of the engines and the noises of them eating. Cerria replays the events of the day in her head, tracking him down the valley and the shootout with the stormtroopers before remembering something.

“Whats grogu? Is it a planet I haven’t been to yet?”

There’s a long pause before Din replies. “He’s my son.”

“You have a son?!” it takes every ounce of willpower, Mandolorian code and respect for Din not to whip around and stare at him opened mouth. “You have a son?” she repeats.

“Yes,” Din laughs slightly at her response. “He’s back on Nevarro. I left him with friends because I knew Crait was too risky and I wasn’t convinced the Jedi was there anyways.”

Cerria sits in stunned silence aware of the well of warm pride growing in her chest. “I can’t believe you have a son. That’s amazing. And Grogu… not my first choice in name but I guess it’s a family name.”

“Probably.”

Cerria hesitates at the ‘probably’ and then lets it go. Din has always tried to be mysterious. “So he’s back at Nevarro with his mother?”

“No I’ve left him with a very trusted friend, a former shock trooper and dropper for the rebellion. After me, there’s no one I trust more with my kid’s life,” Din replies, the pride evident in his voice.

Done with her stew, Cerria puts her helmet back on which prompts Din who’s also finished to do the same. Cerria crosses the room. “Well if the dropper’s I’ve met are anything to go by, nothing short of a death star will prize that kid from her arms.”

“She’s from Alderaan.”

Cerria flinched. “Poor taste. My bad.”

Cerria disappears for a few minutes and returns with an extra blanket for Din. Despite not saying anything he looks cold and accepts it without argument confirming her theory. Blood loss does weird things and she usually has the thermostat down cold anyways. She sits down at the foot of his bed, leaning against the cot and slowly muses what he told her.

“I cant believe you have a kid, I’m so stoked for you… I’m sure you heard the other two went to great beyond and I’m never having kids. I realised that a long time ago, this life and my own hang ups are no excuse to bring a kid into this world. And despite what they tell you on the big planets, the Empire is still here. Its just underground. But I’m happy for you,” Cerria rambles a little, tired and still not totally processing that the most stoic, business-like member of their friend group is now a father.

“Thank you.”

“Can I meet him?”

Din laughs slightly. “Yes.”

Cerria cheers a little and punches his ankle in excitement. “I get to meet baby-Din. I might even let him have one of the lothcats I have onboard.”

“Is that what I can smell?” Din asks tiredly. He sounds like he’s fading.

“Yeah I bounty-hunt critters for rich people and zoos. Usually keeps me away from the remnants of the empire. Usually,” she shrugs.

“I’ll pass on the lothcat,” Din mutters.

Cerria gets up and slaps his thigh playfully. “I’ll let you sleep we should be in Nevarro by the time you wake anyways. Night, night.”

“Goodnight Cerria. And thank you.”

“Anytime.”

*****

Cerria stands staring into the pram as Din drops heavily in the chair in the small kitchen as the other woman in the room, the presumed dropper judging by her stripes tries not to obviously fuss in front of another Mando but is clearly worried. He’s awake, looking up at Cerria curiously with eyes as dark as deep space and huge long ears like a fathier and healthy frog green skin that’s wrinkly as a… Cerria pushed that thought away.

“Foundling,” she says out loud, jolting Din and the woman out of the gaze they were holding. “You forgot to mention he was a foundling.”

“He’s my son by creed,” Din replies shortly.

“Certainly not by blood,” Cerria shakes her head as he coos at her. Cerria looks across at the other woman. “I’m Cerria Adis, I’m from the same tribe as beskar brains over here and we went through the academy together.”

Still dressed in a night dress that doesn’t quite brush her knees revealing powerful thighs that could snap a mans neck effortlessly, the other woman regards her steadily. “Cara Dune.”

“The dropper, Din has told me a lot about you,” Cerria replies.

Din’s head snaps back in Cerria’s direction. “No I didn’t.”

“Why not?” Cara says at the same time Cerria calls him a liar.

“He told me you were the only other person in the galaxy he trusted his kid with aside from himself, which I figure is about the highest praise he can dish out. I mean if I had a kid I’d have no issues leaving it with a former shock trooper either,” Cerria replies finally sitting down.

“I can handle drops into enemy territory but I’m still not good with the whole baby thing,” she replies, sounding like she’s relaxed a little.

“He’s not dead yet,” Din replies.

Cara turns back to Mando. “I need you out of that shirt Mando, I want to have a better look at that shoulder.”

Din wordlessly obeys and shrugs out of the biggest shirt I could find with Cara’s help before leaning back in the chair. Cara’s eyes find the tattoo on his arm and she smiles slightly, dimpling her cheeks. “I didn’t know you had this.”

“She has one too.”

Cara looks at Cerria and then back at Din curiously. “Mandalorian creed?”

“No idiot kids who just graduated academy who went to the same dodgy tattoo joint after a lot of booze,” Cerria responds.

Cara’s smile widens. “I thought only us idiots in the rebellion did that after academy or a big win.”

“Idiocy is endemic to all young species,” Cerria replies.

Cara examines Cerria’s poor work and looks across in disgust. “Did they not teach basic first aid in Mando school.”

“They did. I was out pod racing and being a public menace most days,” Cerria replies cheerfully.

Cara leaves and returns with a medpack and some bacta spray. She watches Cerria for a few seconds as she unrolls the bandage, her brow furrowed with a look of curiosity. “You’re a lot less… This is the way… than-“ she jerks her head at Din who looks up at her, probably in disgust.

“Never taken my helmet off, never had it removed. I just chose not to bounty hunt sentient species, less risky… unless you run into your own kind,” Cerria adds with a wry snort. “Plus I’m a foundling from Jakku. We’re all a bit… feral.”

Cara nods with a wry grin. “Of course, you’re from Jakku. Figures.”

“What happened? This is pretty bad,” Cara has returned her attention back to Din while stood between his splayed legs. There’s an intimacy… connection between these two that blind Freddy could spot in a crowded cantina.

Cerria begins to explain how she came to be on Crait and began trailing Din at a distance which causes him to look over. Cerria mentally pats herself on the back that he obviously didn’t know he was being followed as she continues with the troopers appearing out of nowhere and the ensuing battle. Cara looks over in unconcealed respect as Cerria describes how she finished off the troopers and carried Din back to her own ship.  
“So despite being the class clown and not wearing half the galaxy’s reserve of beskar I manage to do ok for myself,” Cerria finishes.

Cara laughs and even Cerria admits it’s a beautiful, loud laugh. Din looks up at her and even with the helmet, Cerria can feel the adoration radiating off him. Cara steps away from him and washes her hands in the sink. “You’re good in a gunfight, but your first aid skills are ordinary.”

“I’m alive,” Din mumbles.

Cerria shrugs. “Been awhile since I’ve had to patch up a human.”

Cara bites her lip. “This needs stitches but I don’t have any serious medical supplies in the house. If I leave him here will you make sure he dosnt move?”

“Yes ma’am,” Cerria replies.

Cara nods firmly and disappears down the corridor. Din shifts anxiously, still shirtless and probably like most of our kind feels practically naked with anything less than his full armour on. Cara returns dressed a few moments later and disappears out the front door towards the marketplace we passed that was just waking up in the pre-dawn light. Cerria watches Cara’s head disappear out the window before looking back at Din whose head is turned away from her.

“Din…. She’s amazing. What are you doing with your life man?”

He ignores her.

“Oi. Batha-brains I’m talking to you! One of the sexiest droppers was just stood between your feet in nothing but a nighty, whose been babysitting your kid and you’re not feeling nothing?” Cerria demands.

“I didn’t say that.”

“Ok so you do like her. ..Have you told her?”

“Told her what?”

“Oh for kriff’s sake Din. How you feel? Have you told her how you feel?” Cerria demands frustratedly.

Din finally looks over at Cerria. “Bounty hunting is a complicated business we could get killed-“

“Shut your mouth or I will jam that modulator down your throat so hard you will sound like a three-pio droid,” Cerria hisses venomously across the table. “I know how hard this job is, even in my line. Anything could happen tomorrow and that’s it. You nearly died dang farrik. Tell the woman how you feel.”

“Why?”

Cerria stares across the table at him. “What do you mean why? She obviously cares about you and you stare at her like the two suns of Tatoonie shine out of her… nose. Let her in Din, its so easy to go through this life shutting everything out because of your own trauma, the creed, the Empire… whatever. But you can’t hide behind your helmet forever. Let her in.”

It takes him a long time to reply. “I don’t know if I can. I have only just made room for this kid.”

Cerria watches him for a few moments, knowing too well how he feels. As a foundling in the Mandolorian creed you’re cared for but its not like family. Cerria was fourteen when her family were killed so she remembers what having parents is like but you still put up a brick wall that’s very easy to hide behind under a layer of armour. “Yes you can. Does she know your name?”

“Yes.”

“Then that’s the biggest thing.”

“Its not and you know it,” he looks back at Cerria.

There’s a silence for a little longer. The child has scrambled out of his pram and ambles across the floor. Din painfully leans down and lifts him up to his bare chest.

“He has abilities you know,” Din offers.

“Don’t change the subject,” Cerria unmistakeably glares at him through her visor.

The kid looks at Cerria and coos. “Does the name Bo-Katan mean anything to you?” Din asks suddenly.

“Bo-Katan of clan Kyrze, sister of Satine the Empress who by all accounts was hot and heavy with Jedi. What of her?” Cerria mutters tiredly.

“She said we’re of a cult, the Death Watch and-“ Din begins, sounding unsure.

“And she’s a nutjob red head who tried to get in with the Sith and then shock horror they wanted to rule Mandalore so she’s been fighting them and the Empire ever since. I’ve had two run ins with her and we parted on bad terms,” I reply tartly.

“She- they remove their helmets.”

Cerria looks tiredly at Din and sighs. “Yeah. They choose to interpret the creed a lot looser than we do. What of it?”

Din hesitates, the kid is fussy in his arms. “Are they right?”

“No of course not. The creed is iron clad, they’re the ones who are bending it to suit their own whims. Of course its easier to live your life without this on all the time,” she pauses to wrap her knuckles on the side of her helmet, "but its not about doing whats easy, its about doing whats right. And while I'm not the most rigid, by the books Mando there is out there, I dont bend on the important stuff. Why do you think I'm still single."

Din dosnt answer and Cerria begins to feel bad that she snapped. “You can leave at any time you know? Slip off the helmet and settle down with that hot shock trooper.”

Din shakes his head. “I don’t know what to do.”

Cerria watches the child wriggle around on his chest making some very adorable noises. “Well I don’t know how you ended up with the kid but if I know you, it wasn’t an easy choice. And deciding what to do in this instance, wont be easy but I know you’ll make the right choice.”

Din looks across the table and nods slowly. “Thank you.”

Cerria dips her helmet in a nod. “This is the way.”


End file.
